Fighting Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow: Can Douglas Ross Save the Union?

William Atkinson (Committee Member) is a third year reading History at Christ Church.

“If it were done when ’tis done”, schemed Macbeth, “then ’twere well it were done quickly.” Clearly the Scottish Tories know their Shakespeare, as last week’s defenestration of Jackson Carlaw and his replacement by Douglas Ross was an infinite improvement on the Thame of Glamis’ bloody coup. There were no other leadership candidates, no hustings were needed and not a vote had to be cast. No witches plotted Carlaw’s downfall this time, but instead a collection of MSPs and MPs with the best interests of their party and country at heart. But it would be wrong to tarnish Ross by suggesting he shares Macbeth’s murderous ambition. The job of leader of the Scottish Conservatives is rather less attractive than that of King of Scotland, and the perils are much greater.  

There is a Queen to contend with, after all. Nicola Sturgeon has a streak of Lady Macbeth in her. Any allegations of royal aspirations are only compounded by her retinue of Braveheart-wannabes in the Scottish National Party and the fawning approach of most of the Scottish media. Ross has the unenviable task of squaring up to her to save the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in a Scotland where Brexit, Boris and his handling of the pandemic are deeply unpopular. These obstacles easily did for his predecessor. An amiable former used car salesman, Jackson Carlaw’s brief leadership was almost a thank you for forty years of loyal service to his party. But after he saw half his party’s Scottish MPs lost last December, Nicola Sturgeon win plaudits for her handling of the pandemic and the SNP and independence surge in popularity, he was clearly deeply out of his depth.

Nothing became of his time as leader like the leaving of it. When a group of senior Scottish Tories came to tell him to fall on his sword last week, he did the decent thing and cleared the way for Ross to lead the party into next year’s Holyrood elections. This MP and former dairy farmer has long been a rising star in the party. Picked out by Ruth Davidson as the cream of the crop of the Tory intake at in 2016, Ross found himself at Westminster the next year after defeating the SNP’s deputy leader Angus Robertson at the 2017 general election. Since then he has made a name for himself down south, briefly serving as a Scottish Office minister before resigning in protest at the Cummings imbroglio. Despite this, he is apparently not out of favour with Number 10. Anyway, his colleagues at Holyrood see distance from Downing Street as a plus.

Ross is certainly a more interesting figure than Carlaw. He has already argued that his experience as a football referee equips him well for dealing with the often-unfriendly reception Conservatives expect north of Hadrian’s Wall. His supporters also hope his leadership will display a bit more of the straight-talking gumption which made Ruth Davidson such a success. Controversy surrounded his comments in 2017 that if he were Prime Minister for a day “without any repercussions” how would “like to see tougher enforcement against Gypsy Travellers”, but not being PC won him plaudits in his constituency. On the other hand, due to his status as an MP, Ruth Davidson will be filling in for his leadership duties in the Scottish Parliament. Bonnie Princess Ruthie will not undermine his position too much as she plans to stand down as an MSP next year to take up a seat in the House of Lords. Having resigned last year to spend more time with her young family, she does not seem likely to reverse her decision anytime soon.

But even with Ross and Ruth in place (like a Caledonian Friends) the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party still face an enormous uphill battle in curbing the SNP’s dominance and keeping the United Kingdom together. The party far behind in the polls facing an election in less than a year. Whilst the Scottish government currently governs as a minority with the help of the independence-backing Greens, the expectation is that May’s election will see it win a majority outright. This majority would be taken as a mandate to call for a second referendum on Scottish independence. At times since the 2014 referendum the prospect of this has seemed to recede in likelihood alongside falling support for breaking up the United Kingdom. But the past few months have seen support for independence surge in popularity.

It’s true that leaving the EU and Carlaw’s quiet leadership haven’t exactly been boons for the Unionist cause. But the major boost in support for the nationalists has come from Nicola Sturgeon’s handling of this pandemic. As well as fronting all of the Scottish government’s press briefings, she has received rave reviews for her handling of the pandemic from a Scottish media rather more supine than its English equivalent. All available evidence suggests Holyrood has handled this pandemic little better than Westminster. But polls suggesting that three-quarters of Scots believing they have handled the pandemic better than south of the border make surging support for independence less surprising. With the most recent poll put support for independence at 54% and the SNP’s over 30% ahead of the Conservatives, it almost seems Ross has inherited a hospital pass.

Call me a hopeless optimist (or hopeless Unionist), but I think all is not lost. Scottish politics since the referendum has proved remarkably fluid. Despite the SNP surging to take all but three Scottish seats in 2015, they fell back by over 20 MPs two years later. Similarly, at the 2016 Holyrood election they were expected to romp home to another majority and didn’t. At the same time, the Scottish Conservatives have rocketed from having only one MP since 2001 (and none in 1997) to being both the main opposition party in the Scottish Parliament and possessing first 13 and now 6 MPs in the House of Commons. The roots of the revival were obvious – Ruth Davidson and a rigorous focus on the Union. Davidson was an atypical Tory as every profile of her as a “a kick-boxing Glaswegian lesbian” mentions ad infinitum. An explicit Unionist message also appealed to voters alienated by the Labour Party’s ongoing confusion in the face of the SNP’s onslaught – not helped by the fact their Scottish branch is currently led by a Yorkshireman.  The hope now is that Ross can repeat some of Ruth’s appeal. But the question is open as to whether a single-minded focus on the Union the right approach still for next year’s election. After all, if the SNP win a majority after both they and the Tories have treated such a victory as a vote for a second referendum it will be it even harder for the Prime Minister to deny one.

Number 10 is currently pushing for Ross to focus on the SNP’s domestic record. The case for an independent Scotland governed in-perpetuity by a Sturgeon ascendancy becomes much harder to make when you analyse their dismal record in power. Scotland’s education system has gone from being one of Europe’s best to one of her worst. A chaotic re-organization of the police put patriotic branding before public safety. Failures in both the healthcare system and care-homes (pre-dating the pandemic) are ripe for attack, as are authoritarian proposals like a state-mandated adult for every child and a hate crime legislation so opaque it could make quoting the Bible illegal. But with the Union at the forefront of the debate, the Nats get off Scot free. Moreover, it means the Tories win votes for the Unionist part in Scottish Conservative and Unionist and not the Conservative. Though differences in opinion between Scotland and the rest of the UK on political issues are often over-hyped, decades of dominance by parties of the centre-left and a vote to Remain suggests Scottish voters are more comfortable with a larger state and closer ties with the EU than us Brexiteering Anglo-Saxons. Drawing attention to that might not be wise if keeping Scotland in the UK is our number one priority.

But the problems facing preserving our Union are bigger than one election, clashing personalities and policy programs. It is about time we acknowledged that the current devolution settlement is fundamentally flawed. Rather than “killing nationalism stone dead” as Labour claimed it would in 1995, it has instead provided the SNP with a permanent platform from which to grievance monger. The recent dispute between Holyrood and Westminster over powers returning to the UK from the EU which are essential for the functioning of our internal market are a case in point. The never-ending demand for “more powers” from the SNP and the eager handing over of them by clueless Labour and Conservative governments has undermined the primacy of Westminster. Rather than kill off nationalist demands, it has only fed them and made independence more likely. The most egregious example of this was David Cameron’s granting of the first referendum back in 2011. In hindsight, that decision - like the very granting of devolution itself in 1997 – was one of enormous folly.

We therefore need a change of approach; in Cold War terms, a shift from Containment to Roll Back. Some centre-right commentators like Iain Martin, James Forsyth and Dan Hannan have argued the solution moving to a more federal Britain, but this has strikes me as fundamentally foolish. Handing over more powers, entrenching nationalism and heightening the differences in government between different parts of the United Kingdom is exactly what the SNP want. It makes Scotland’s government more powerful in comparison to the UK’s, whilst still leaving enough room for the SNP to blame Westminster when anything goes wrong. A good rule of thumb is that every act that weakens Westminster and strengthens Holyrood makes independence more likely, making a federal Britain a very silly idea.

Instead, it is time to reform New Labour’s errors and redefine the constitutional relationship with a new Act of Union. This has been called for by both Stephen Daisley and Henry Hill. This could take a number of forms: Daisley suggests a bill outlining the location of sovereignty and the balance of powers between national, devolved and local government, whereas Hill has suggested a law similar to than in Spain or Germany which makes it illegal for parts of the country to break away.  Either way it would tell be a ready sign for nationalists both in Scotland and across the UK that efforts to weaken the Union go no further. With another referendum off the table, politics in Scotland would hopefully return to normal. Every election would no longer turn on your views on the Union but on the economy, schools and other issues. This would be a boon to both Scottish Labour and the Liberal Democrats. That is a small price to pay if it means them taking votes from the SNP. When they did so in 2017 it helped shave off a third of the nationalists’ MPs and 3/10 of their vote share.

Such an Act would be more than just a statement of intent for Scottish Unionists. It would help refocus the attention of a national Conservative and Unionist party that often seems to forget the second half of its name.  Recent polls have shown significant minorities of English Conservatives who are indifferent about seeing the Union break up. Undoubtedly, there is an eternal strain of English opinion that looks at any money handed over to Holyrood – especially during this pandemic – and is infuriated by getting only the SNP’s intransigence in return. Why not kick the whining Jocks out of the UK if it means saving a few billion? But the Union is far more important than a bit of Treasury book-keeping. There are not only the emotional ties of a common history, but sincere practical reasons for any Conservative to want to keep the country together. Not only would a country that has lost a third of its area and a tenth of its population immediately be less attractive for post-Brexit trade deals, but the United Kingdom would no longer be a significant power on the world stage without Scotland. We would have nowhere to park our nuclear submarines as the current bases are at Faslane and Coulport and an independent Scottish government would ask for their removals without a viable alternative anywhere in England, Northern Ireland or Wales. As Stephen Daisley has argued, why do you think Putin’s puppets on Russia Today are so keen on Scottish independence?

It is easy point out the inadequacies of the nationalists’ case. An independent Scotland would immediately have the largest debt to GDP ratio in Europe (pandemic notwithstanding). Moreover, the SNP’s plan to re-join the EU would mean having to severely reduce that to comply with entry requirements. This would enquire austerity far larger than anything practiced by George Osborne: cuts worth the equivalent of over 80% of the Scottish NHS budget. Furthermore, if a free-trade deal isn’t agreed between the United Kingdom and the EU by the end of this year there would have to be a border between Scotland and England. There is the obvious folly in this of putting tariffs up against the rest of the UK, which takes two thirds of Scottish export, in favour of the EU, which takes less than 20%. That is before even addressing the currency question: would Scotland try and pay its bills with a Pound over which it has no control, or would it adopt the Euro – something that has worked out so well for Greece, Italy and others.  Scotland would be sacrificing a disproportionately large role in a Union of equals to be a smaller, poorer member of a club rigged in the interests of France and Germany. That would not so much be independence as subservience.

Of course, this means not a jot to your average Scottish nationalist. Their entire world view is predicated on the idea England is in irreparable decline and that Scotland has a brighter future aping Nordic social democracy than it does playing second fiddle to the Americans in NATO. Though Scotland benefits disproportionately in the distribution of funds within the Union – to the tune of something like £2,000 a head – her economy is quite robust and her average living standards are often above the English average. Despite the immediate austerity independence would require it is entirely possible Scotland would eventually make a future for herself outside of the United Kingdom. What is more, independence would be the crowning glory to a version of Scottish history that charts a long tale of resistance against English domination via Bannockburn and Culloden. As for the Irish a century ago, the economics plays second fiddle to the fulfilling of national destiny being fulfilled. Unfortunately for us, this sub-Mel Gibson myth is better than anything Unionists are producing and is being poured into the heads of Scottish schoolchildren. Or would be if their schools were open.

It is time we Unionists challenged it. As any decent historian will tell you, it is largely nonsense. There is a great Hugh Trevor-Roper book that illustrates how most elements of Scottish nationalism are post-Union inventions from the minds of Sir Walter Scott and others (including, magnificently, tartans). Before uniting with England and Wales, Scotland was a medieval tip dominated by murderous clans, violent highlanders, and religious fanatics.  It was the political stability, free trade and – sorry lefties – Empire provided by the Union that transformed Scotland into a prosperous hub of the Enlightenment, the home to David Hume and Adam Smith. But historical accuracy is not the only reason for challenging the SNP’s fairy-tale. As bizarre as it may seem, before the 1960s the Scottish Unionists were the most popular party in Scotland. Their appeal was based on emphasising the common benefits of the Union and the disproportionate global role in brought Scots. As the Empire dissolved, Europe beckoned and British politics descended from managing the world to keeping the lights on, the appeal of traditional Unionism faded.  Mrs Thatcher and New Labour kept it in deep freeze until Ruth came along.

As unpopular as Brexit might be with some Scots, it does provide an unprecedented opportunity for reviving this form of Unionism for the 21st century. Not only does can we rebrand EU infrastructure funds with a Union Jack – though as Rishi Sunak is currently unknown above the border, despite his magnificent furlough scheme, that might be a good start – or emphasise how much less promising leaving the EU makes the nationalist prospectus. It means we can rebalance the roles of different parts of the UK and re-establish ourselves as a global force for good.  We are still a leading power in NATO and a nuclear power with a seat on the UN Security Council. That Empire is now a Commonwealth – and one we’ve neglected for the last fifty years. “Taking back control” does not mean just mean the hegemony of Westminster replacing that of Brussels. We have a great opportunity to review the structure of devolution in the UK both locally and nationally alongside the sovereignty and cash we are repatriating from across the Channel. This does not mean (yet?) doing away with the Scottish Parliament in favour of more local or regional devolution. But it does mean showing Scots that they can have more control over their futures both outside of the EU. It would also undermine the SNP grievance-machine at Holyrood. More than anything, it would show the Union has a bright future in the wider world. Not a little England, but a Great Britain. 

A lot for Douglas Ross to be thinking about. Can he do it? Clipping the SNP’s wings and saving the Union is a monumental task, even with the weight of Downing Street behind him. If he fails, the future is too terrible to contemplate. But if he can screw his courage to the sticking place, he will not fail. We can only hope it does not end as messily for him as it did for Macbeth.